Urban X Award Winners Announced

HOLLYWOOD — A raucous ceremony for the second annual Urban X Awards took place Sunday night at Boulevard 3, seeing winners announced in nearly 60 categories recognizing excellence in black, Asian and Latin erotica.

The affair was hosted by adult stars Roxy Reynolds and Mr. Marcus, and included performances by Medusa, Brian Pumper and Joe Moses. Industry personality James Bartholet emceed as the stars filtered into the main hall to take their seats for the event. And they all got revved up aplenty when Medusa took the stage to begin the show with her tracks "Dusty Ball Drop" and "Ready, Set, Action."

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Marcus and Reynolds then appeared, he in a grey suit and his signature L.A. Dodgers ballcap, she in an elegant orange gown. Reynolds gave a brief summary of the show's mission, saying it aims to recognize "all your favorite porn stars who've been overlooked this year by that other show." (We assume she was referring to the RogReviews.com Fan Faves Awards.)

The first award of the evening was the Hall of Fame Male honor, bestowed upon Wesley Pipes, T.T. Boy, Mark Anthony and Sledge Hammer. Pinky presented the award, with the intro: "Just like NBA players who make it to the Hall of Fame, these guys really know how to take it to the hole." T.T. Boy was the only recipient not present to accept the award, but Mark Anthony spoke well enough for all four of them by cracking, "Well, I'm in the Hall of Fame, I guess I'll retire now."

Speaking of Pinky, it was a very big night for the diminutive star. She collected Best Talent Website, Female Performer of the Year and Porn Star of the Year, receiving massive cheers each time she appeared on stage.

West Coast Productions had a good night as well, scooping up trophies in seven categories, including Best Studio for the second year in a row. Alexander DeVoe Productions matched that tally, with DeVoe himself being named Director of the Year, and making almost as impressive showings were Mercenary Pictures and Justin Slayer International, the latter taking the Best New Company prize.

After several cases of winners taking a lengthy amount of time to make it onto the stage for their awards, the show jumped into expedited mode, with a list of categories and their winning parties simply being read off over the loudspeakers, and those who'd won being told to go collect their awards backstage.

Dana DeArmond, who was announced two weeks ago as a third co-host of the show, curiously never appeared, despite being in attendance. This seemed to have been because of the effort to speed the show's second half along, and an apology was issued to her over the speakers, with thanks for offering her co-hosting services. She also got a shout out from Rico Strong when he accepted their Best Anal Scene trophy for Rico the Destroyer (Alexander DeVoe Productions/Jules Jordan Video). "Where's Dana DeArmond at?" Rico hollered into the mic. "Baby, this is for me and you!"

Completely missing in action, meanwhile, was Christian Mann, to accept a Lifetime Achievement award for his founding of pioneering ethnic studio Video Team and its sister label Afro-Centric Productions.

A much anticipated moment came late in the show, when Brian Pumper performed two of his own rap singles, noting in his talk-up banter, "A lot of modeling bitches think they're too good to swallow. Bitch, shut up and swallow my babies!"

Maybe the most pointed speech of the evening came from Hall of Fame inductee Sinnamon Love. "I just want to say to all the new girls in the business, save your money," she cautioned. "Don't think this shit is going to last forever."

Urban X founder Giana Taylor told AVN that this show "was more stressful than the last one." Nevertheless, she was very pleased with the turnout. "It means a lot," she said. "I just want everybody to continue to support me and come out and have a good time ... black, white, Latin, Asian, everyone. It's not about me honoring them, I want them to come out and honor themselves for all their hard work. Now I'm looking forward to 2010, which will be bigger and better. We're going to keep moving up."